


english class passages

by cornloverlol



Category: english class tingz
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-19 10:42:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29998155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cornloverlol/pseuds/cornloverlol
Summary: hi! so basically I hate reading a Google Doc story with the font on like 2. that's exactly what my English teacher gives us for stories to read. so i copy and paste them here because I like ao3's style better. that's it,,, tbh i don't know how anyone would find this but it's just for fun anyways.okay bye :)





	1. Chickamauga (Ambrose Bierce)

ONE SUNNY AUTUMN afternoon a child strayed away from its rude home in a small field and entered a forest unobserved. It was happy in a new sense of freedom from control, happy in the opportunity of exploration and  
adventure; for this child’s spirit, in bodies of its ancestors, had for thousands of years been trained to memorable  
feats of discovery and conquest—victories in battles whose critical moments were centuries, whose victors’ camps  
were cities of hewn stone. From the cradle of its race it had conquered its way through two continents and  
passing a great sea had penetrated a third, there to be born to war and dominion as a heritage.  
The child was a boy aged about six years, the son of a poor planter. In his younger manhood the father had  
been a soldier, had fought against naked savages and followed the flag of his country into the capital of a civilized  
race to the far South. In the peaceful life of a planter the warrior-fire survived; once kindled, it is never  
extinguished. The man loved military books and pictures and the boy had understood enough to make himself a  
wooden sword, though even the eye of his father would hardly have known it for what it was. This weapon he  
now bore bravely, as became the son of an heroic race, and pausing now and again in the sunny space of the  
forest assumed, with some exaggeration, the postures of aggression and defense that he had been taught by the  
engraver’s art. Made reckless by the ease with which he overcame invisible foes attempting to stay his advance, he  
committed the common enough military error of pushing the pursuit to a dangerous extreme, until he found  
himself upon the margin of a wide but shallow brook, whose rapid waters barred his direct advance against the  
flying foe that had crossed with illogical ease. But the intrepid victor was not to be baffled; the spirit of the race  
which had passed the great sea burned unconquerable in that small breast and would not be denied. Finding a  
place where some bowlders in the bed of the stream lay but a step or a leap apart, he made his way across and fell  
again upon the rear-guard of his imaginary foe, putting all to the sword.  
Now that the battle had been won, prudence required that he withdraw to his base of operations. Alas; like  
many a mightier conqueror, and like one, the mightiest, he could not  
curb the lust for war,  
Nor learn that tempted Fate will leave the loftiest star.  
Advancing from the bank of the creek he suddenly found himself confronted with a new and more formidable  
enemy: in the path that he was following, sat, bolt upright, with ears erect and paws suspended before it, a rabbit!  
With a startled cry the child turned and fled, he knew not in what direction, calling with inarticulate cries for his  
mother, weeping, stumbling, his tender skin cruelly torn by brambles, his little heart beating hard with terror—  
breathless, blind with tears—lost in the forest! Then, for more than an hour, he wandered with erring feet  
through the tangled undergrowth, till at last, overcome by fatigue, he lay down in a narrow space between two  
rocks, within a few yards of the stream and still grasping his toy sword, no longer a weapon but a companion,  
sobbed himself to sleep. The wood birds sang merrily above his head; the squirrels, whisking their bravery of tail,  
ran barking from tree to tree, unconscious of the pity of it, and somewhere far away was a strange, muffed  
thunder, as if the partridges were drumming in celebration of nature’s victory over the son of her immemorial  
enslavers. And back at the little plantation, where white men and black were hastily searching the fields and  
hedges in alarm, a mother’s heart was breaking for her missing child.  
Hours passed, and then the little sleeper rose to his feet. The chill of the evening was in his limbs, the fear of  
the gloom in his heart. But he had rested, and he no longer wept. With some blind instinct which impelled to  
action he struggled through the undergrowth about him and came to a more open ground—on his right the  
brook, to the left a gentle acclivity studded with infrequent trees; over all, the gathering gloom of twilight. A thin,  
ghostly mist rose along the water. It frightened and repelled him; instead of recrossing, in the direction whence he  
had come, he turned his back upon it, and went forward toward the dark inclosing wood. Suddenly he saw before  
him a strange moving object which he took to be some large animal—a dog, a pig—he could not name it; perhaps  
it was a bear. He had seen pictures of bears, but knew of nothing to their discredit and had vaguely wished to  
meet one. But something in form or movement of this object—something in the awkwardness of its approach—  
told him that it was not a bear, and curiosity was stayed by fear. He stood still and as it came slowly on gained  
courage every moment, for he saw that at least it had not the long menacing ears of the rabbit. Possibly his  
impressionable mind was half conscious of something familiar in its shambling, awkward gait. Before it had

approached near enough to resolve his doubts he saw that it was followed by another and another. To right and to  
left were many more; the whole open space about him were alive with them—all moving toward the brook.  
They were men. They crept upon their hands and knees. They used their hands only, dragging their legs. They  
used their knees only, their arms hanging idle at their sides. They strove to rise to their feet, but fell prone in the  
attempt. They did nothing naturally, and nothing alike, save only to advance foot by foot in the same direction.  
Singly, in pairs and in little groups, they came on through the gloom, some halting now and again while others  
crept slowly past them, then resuming their movement. They came by dozens and by hundreds; as far on either  
hand as one could see in the deepening gloom they extended and the black wood behind them appeared to be  
inexhaustible. The very ground seemed in motion toward the creek. Occasionally one who had paused did not  
again go on, but lay motionless. He was dead. Some, pausing, made strange gestures with their hands, erected  
their arms and lowered them again, clasped their heads; spread their palms upward, as men are sometimes seen to  
do in public prayer.  
Not all of this did the child note; it is what would have been noted by an elder observer; he saw little but that  
these were men, yet crept like babes. Being men, they were not terrible, though unfamiliarly clad. He moved  
among them freely, going from one to another and peering into their faces with childish curiosity. All their faces  
were singularly white and many were streaked and gouted with red. Something in this—something too, perhaps,  
in their grotesque attitudes and movements—reminded him of the painted clown whom he had seen last summer  
in the circus, and he laughed as he watched them. But on and ever on they crept, these maimed and bleeding  
men, as heedless as he of the dramatic contrast between his laughter and their own ghastly gravity. To him it was  
a merry spectacle. He had seen his father’s negroes creep upon their hands and knees for his amusement—had  
ridden them so, “making believe” they were his horses. He now approached one of these crawling figures from  
behind and with an agile movement mounted it astride. The man sank upon his breast, recovered, flung the small  
boy fiercely to the ground as an unbroken colt might have done, then turned upon him a face that lacked a lower  
jaw—from the upper teeth to the throat was a great red gap fringed with hanging shreds of flesh and splinters of  
bone. The unnatural prominence of nose, the absence of chin, the fierce eyes, gave this man the appearance of a  
great bird of prey crimsoned in throat and breast by the blood of its quarry. The man rose to his knees, the child  
to his feet. The man shook his fist at the child; the child, terrified at last, ran to a tree near by, got upon the  
farther side of it and took a more serious view of the situation. And so the clumsy multitude dragged itself slowly  
and painfully along in hideous pantomime—moved forward down the slope like a swarm of great black beetles,  
with never a sound of going—in silence profound, absolute.  
Instead of darkening, the haunted landscape began to brighten. Through the belt of trees beyond the brook  
shone a strange red light, the trunks and branches of the trees making a black lacework against it. It struck the  
creeping figures and gave them monstrous shadows, which caricatured their movements on the lit grass. It fell  
upon their faces, touching their whiteness with a ruddy tinge, accentuating the stains with which so many of  
them were freaked and maculated. It sparkled on buttons and bits of metal in their clothing. Instinctively the  
child turned toward the growing splendor and moved down the slope with his horrible companions; in a few  
moments had passed the foremost of the throng—not much of a feat, considering his advantages. He placed  
himself in the lead, his wooden sword still in hand, and solemnly directed the march, conforming his pace to  
theirs and occasionally turning as if to see that his forces did not straggle. Surely such a leader never before had  
such a following.  
Scattered about upon the ground now slowly narrowing by the encroachment of this awful march to water,  
were certain articles to which, in the leader’s mind, were coupled no significant associations: an occasional blanket  
tightly rolled lengthwise, doubled and the ends bound together with a string; a heavy knapsack here, and there a  
broken rifle—such things, in short, as are found in the rear of retreating troops, the “spoor” of men flying from  
their hunters. Everywhere near the creek, which here had a margin of lowland, the earth was trodden into mud  
by the feet of men and horses. An observer of better experience in the use of his eyes would have noticed that  
these footprints pointed in both directions; the ground had been twice passed over—in advance and in retreat. A  
few hours before, these desperate, stricken men, with their more fortunate and now distant comrades, had  
penetrated the forest in thousands. Their successive battalions, breaking into swarms and reforming in lines, had  
passed the child on every side—had almost trodden on him as he slept. The rustle and murmur of their march  
had not awakened him. Almost within a stone’s throw of where he lay they had fought a battle; but all unheard

by him were the roar of the musketry, the shock of the cannon, “the thunder of the captains and the shouting.”  
He had slept through it all, grasping his little wooden sword with perhaps a tighter clutch in unconscious  
sympathy with his martial environment, but as heedless of the grandeur of the struggle as the dead who had died  
to make the glory.  
The fire beyond the belt of woods on the farther side of the creek, reflected to earth from the canopy of its  
own smoke, was now suffusing the whole landscape. It transformed the sinuous line of mist to the vapor of gold.  
The water gleamed with dashes of red, and red, too, were many of the stones protruding above the surface. But  
that was blood; the less desperately wounded had stained them in crossing. On them, too, the child now crossed  
with eager steps; he was going to the fire. As he stood upon the farther bank he turned about to look at the  
companions of his march. The advance was arriving at the creek. The stronger had already drawn themselves to  
the brink and plunged their faces into the flood. Three or four who lay without motion appeared to have no  
heads. At this the child’s eyes expanded with wonder; even his hospitable understanding could not accept a  
phenomenon implying such vitality as that. After slaking their thirst these men had not had the strength to back  
away from the water, nor to keep their heads above it. They were drowned. In rear of these, the open spaces of  
the forest showed the leader as many formless figures of his grim command as at first; but not nearly so many  
were in motion. He waved his cap for their encouragement and smilingly pointed with his weapon in the  
direction of the guiding light—a pillar of fire to this strange exodus.  
Confident of the fidelity of his forces, he now entered the belt of woods, passed through it easily in the red  
illumination, climbed a fence, ran across a field, turning now and again to coquet with his responsive shadow,  
and so approached the blazing ruin of a dwelling. Desolation everywhere! In all the wide glare not a living thing  
was visible. He cared nothing for that; the spectacle pleased, and he danced with glee in imitation of the wavering  
flames. He ran about, collecting fuel, but every object that he found was too heavy for him to cast in from the  
distance to which the heat limited his approach. In despair he flung in his sword—a surrender to the superior  
forces of nature. His military career was at an end.  
Shifting his position, his eyes fell upon some outbuildings which had an oddly familiar appearance, as if he  
had dreamed of them. He stood considering them with wonder, when suddenly the entire plantation, with its  
inclosing forest, seemed to turn as if upon a pivot. His little world swung half around; the points of the compass  
were reversed. He recognized the blazing building as his own home!

For a moment he stood stupefied by the power of the revelation, then ran with stumbling feet, making a half-  
circuit of the ruin. There, conspicuous in the light of the conflagration, lay the dead body of a woman—the

white face turned upward, the hands thrown out and clutched full of grass, the clothing deranged, the long dark  
hair in tangles and full of clotted blood. The greater part of the forehead was torn away, and from the jagged hole  
the brain protruded, overflowing the temple, a frothy mass of gray, crowned with clusters of crimson bubbles—  
the work of a shell.  
The child moved his little hands, making wild, uncertain gestures. He uttered a series of inarticulate and  
indescribable cries—something between the chattering of an ape and the gobbling of a turkey—a startling,  
soulless, unholy sound, the language of a devil. The child was a deaf mute.  
Then he stood motionless, with quivering lips, looking down upon the wreck.


	2. The Earth on Turtle’s Back (Myth from the Onondaga-Northeast Woodlands, as retold by Caduto & Bruchac)

1 Before this Earth existed, there was only water. It stretched as far as one could see, and in that water there were birds and animals swimming around. Far above, in the clouds, there was a Skyland. In that Skyland there was a great and beautiful tree. It had four white roots which stretched to each of the sacred directions, and from its branches all kinds of fruits and flowers grew.

2 There was an ancient chief in the Skyland. His young wife was expecting a child, and one night she dreamed that she saw the Great Tree uprooted. The next morning she told her husband the story.

3 He nodded as she finished telling her dream. “My wife,” he said, “I am sad that you had this dream. It is clearly a dream of great power and, as is our way, when one has such a powerful dream we must do all that we can to make it true. The Great Tree must be uprooted.”

4 Then the Ancient Chief called the young men together and told them that they must pull up the tree. But the roots of the tree were so deep, so strong, that they could not budge it. At last the Ancient Chief himself came to the tree. He wrapped his arms around it, bent his knees and strained. At last, with one great effort, he uprooted the tree and placed it on its side. Where the tree’s roots had gone deep into the Skyland there was now a big hole. The wife of the chief came close and leaned over to look down, grasping the tip of one of the Great Tree’s branches to steady her. It seemed as if she saw something down there, far below, glittering like water. She leaned out further to look and, as she leaned, she lost her balance and fell into the hole. Her grasp slipped off the tip of the branch, leaving her with only a handful of seeds as she fell, down, down, down, down.

5 Far below, in the waters, some of the birds and animals looked up.

6 “Someone is falling toward us from the sky,” said one of the birds.

7 “We must do something to help her,” said another. Then two Swans flew up. They caught the Woman from the Sky between their wide wings. Slowly, they began to bring her down toward the water, where the birds and animals were watching.

8 “She is not like us,” said one of the animals. “Look, she doesn’t have webbed feet. I don’t think she can live in the water.”

9 “What shall we do, then?” said another of the water animals.

10 “I know,” said one of the water birds. “I have heard that there is Earth far below the waters. If we dive down and bring up earth, then she will have a place to stand. ”

11 So the birds and animals decided that someone would have to bring up Earth. One by one they tried.

12 The Duck dove down first, some say. He swam down and down, far beneath the surface, but could not reach the bottom and floated back up. Then the Beaver tried. He went even deeper, so deep that it was all dark, but he could not reach the bottom, either. The Loon tried, swimming with his strong wings. He was gone a long long time, but he, too, failed to bring up Earth. Soon it seemed that all had tried and all had failed. Then a small voice spoke up.

13 “I will bring up Earth or die trying.”

14 They looked to see who it was. It was the tiny Muskrat. She dove down and swam and swam. She was not as strong or as swift as the others, but she was determined. She went so deep that it was all dark, and still she swam deeper. She went so deep that her lungs felt ready to burst, but she swam deeper still. At last, just as she was becoming unconscious, she reached out one small paw and grasped at the bottom, barely touching it before she floated up, almost dead.

15 When the other animals saw her break the surface they thought she had failed. Then they saw her right paw was held tightly shut.

16 “She has the Earth,” they said. “Now where can we put it?”

17 “Place it on my back,” said a deep voice. It was the Great Turtle, who had come up from the depths.

18 They brought the Muskrat over to the Great Turtle and placed her paw against his back. To this day there are marks at the back of the Turtle’s shell which were made by Muskrat’s paw. The tiny bit of Earth fell on the back of the turtle. Almost immediately, it began to grow larger and larger and larger until it became the whole world.

19 Then the two Swans brought the Sky Woman down. She stepped onto the new Earth and opened her hand, letting the seeds fall onto the bare soil. From those seeds the trees and grass sprang up. Life on Earth had begun.


End file.
